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Statistically speaking, we live in the safest, most peaceful era in the known history of the world. Even in the most optimistic accounts, ancient histories of every race, religion, and culture describe suffering of mankind far beyond what most people today could possibly imagine or even comprehend. In the not-so-distant past, very few people survived to reach adulthood, a condition that the world before us assumed to be indefinite. Even in the more advanced cultures, such as the Roman Empire, only one in seven children survived. For humanity to grow and thrive, every childbearing woman of the ancient world would have to produce at least eight children; seven were required simply for human survival.

Though every ancient culture describes famous military campaigns with hundreds of thousands of merciless warriors leaving paths of devastation for opposing civilizations, and though battle was a way of life for many, survival was not limited to military strength. A simple abscess of a tooth was a death sentence. An infected wound often led to amputation, and if not severed in time, certain death.

For former members of destructive cults, however, the idea of a "safe world" seems foreign. Especially in doomsday cults, where the central figure has predicted the End of Days, cult members are systematically trained to fear the world we live in and rejoice in the thoughts of its demise. Children are raised from birth to believe their friends and neighbors, those who do not believe the central figure, are condemned to horrific deaths and everlasting torment. Though it may take many years to do so, former cult members must find a restored faith in humanity. Second generation members must learn to find a faith in fellow humans that they have never known. In today's world of highly publicized and widely distributed news coverage of distant tragedies or world conflict, this is a challenge. Yet it is critical for finding freedom.